Executives from Walmart, iHeartMedia and TalkShopLive Discuss the Secrets of Live Streaming and the Original Influencers

More highlights from Variety’s Executive Interview Studio, presented by Canva, during this year’s Advertising Week held in New York City. EVP of digital marketing at iHeartMedia Jeff Cucinell, sat down to reveal how they trust the personalities of iHeartRadio and how the early radio were, in fact, the first influencers.

Meanwhile, Bryan Moore, CEO and co-founder of TalkShopLive, sat down with Justin Breton, director of brand experiences and partnerships at Walmart, to break down this rapidly growing new livestream shopping experience. And despite the celebrity names attached to the brand, Moore warns that sometimes all you need is a folding table and a great product.

TalkShopLive Reveals What Fans Are Actually Looking For From The Streaming Platform

TalkShopLive combines live streaming and home shopping and has already hosted big names like Dolly Parton, the Jonas Brothers, John Legend, Anna Wintour, Jennifer Lopez and Matthew McConaughey.

But before Paul McCartney told listeners to shop his talk, Walmart fully embraced the platform. Breton recounted how Walmart was the first brand to integrate with TalkShopLive, inaugurating its attempt at TikTok. “Their technology allowed us to not only provide our customers with a shoppable experience on walmart.com but also off of walmart.com, delivering on that notion of meeting customers where they are online, that shopping experience, feeling frictionless.”

Moore emphasized how this live-streaming technique debunks a TV scheduled advertisement because it adds another dimension of engagement, “One of the things that’s so different from home shopping on linear television that we get to experience together is that people can engage in the video while it’s live, right? The content is also changing in real-time based on what people want to see and why they want to see it.”

Jeff Cucinell of iHeart Media Discusses Innovation, Audience Reach, and the Power of Radio Personalities

Cucinell spoke with complete confidence in the power of the iHeart Radio brand and its 850 radio stations, which reach millions of Americans across the nation. “We have local markets doing groundbreaking interviews daily. We have celebrity guests on our podcast, people at the top of culture.”

He continued, “Whether that be Jay Shetty having a conversation with Shawn Mendez, whether that be the crew on ‘All the Smoke’ having Kamala Harris on the podcast. How do we take all of that great content and share it with the power of our brand?” His goal lies in trusting the brand’s influence when taking it to new mediums, especially visual ones like YouTube.

Another hot topic in the world of radio is podcasting, to which Cuncinell said, “Before there were social media platforms, you had an authentic voice on an authentic platform, radio, speaking to communities. The radio personality is the original influencer.”

The steady and trusted platform understands its position as a major podcasting distributor, “It’s thousands of podcasts in our ecosystem, each with a unique and diverse voice focusing on developing those voices and sharing them to the right audience cohorts is really what we’re focused on as a podcast publisher.”